Sliven, August 13-14, 2015
Two groups of prisoners in the Sliven prison were trained under the project „Prisons Without Risk” on August 13 and 14. The topics of the trainings - hygiene, blood- and sexually transmitted diseases and specificity of the HIV infection process provoked the interest of the thirty women. They asked a lot of questions, some took notes, took an active part and listened very attentively to the explanations of the trainers – the virologist Prof. Radka Argirova, Dr. Rada Stamenkova and Daniela Dikova from the BFPA and Milen Chavrov from the “Hope against AIDS” Foundation. The efforts of the team were supported by Ralitza Zgalevska and Prof. Yuliana Marinova from the BFPA.
Some of the important things, written down by the prisoners as learned after the training visit were:
- HIV and AIDS are two different things/ HIV is not AIDS
- At the notion of whatever symptom, we should talk to a health specialist immediately
- Treatment is for the infected, and VCT is obligatory also for the partner
- Viruses can be oncogenic and infectious
- Sexually transmitted infections can lead to some chronic diseases
- We never use other people’s personal hygiene possessions
The project “Prisons without risk – a pilot initiative for preventing the spread of blood transmitted and sexually transmitted infections in three selected Bulgarian prisons” has duration до 14 months (March 2015 – April 2016). Its aim is to improve the health status of persons serving sentence of "imprisonment" and detainees through provision of services and information to improve health awareness of vulnerable communities in prisons in Plovdiv, Stara Zagora and Sliven.
Besides health issues within the project there will be also educational sessions for prisoners, detainees and staff from the three prisons on the rights of access to healthcare and health services.
Photo gallery from the training
You can find more about the project here
This publication is created with financial support from the Norwegian Financial Mechanism 2009-2014. The entire responsibility for the contents of the document is of BFPA and under no circumstances can be assumed that this document presents official opinion of the Programme Operator or the donor.
